This book is for developers who would like to develop software in C++. Basic programming experience would be an added advantage.

Chapter 1, Getting Started with C++, introduces you to Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) in C++. We start by looking into a simple program that rolls a dice. We write the code, compile, link, and execute the program. We then continue by constructing a simple object-oriented hierarchy, with pointers and dynamic binding. Finally, we create two simple abstract data types: stack and queue. The stack is a set of values ordered in a bottom-to-top manner, where only the top-most value is accessible, while the queue is a traditional queue where we inspect values at the front and add values at the rear.

Chapter 2, Data Structures and Algorithms, builds on what was learned in the previous chapter, especially the list and set abstract datatypes. We also introduce templates and operator overloading, and we look into linear and binary search algorithms and the insert, select, bubble, merge, and quicksort algorithms.

Chapter 3, Building a Library Management System, will help you develop a real-world system: a library management system that is made up of books and customers. The books keep track of the customers that have borrowed and reserved them, and the customers keep track of the books they have borrowed and reserved.

Chapter 4, Library Management System with Pointers, further develops the library management system. In the previous chapter, each book and customer were identified by integer numbers. In this chapter, however, we work with pointers. Each book holds pointers to the customers that have borrowed or reserved it, and each customer holds pointers to the books they have borrowed or reserved.

Chapter 5, Qt Graphical Applications, dives into three graphical applications that we develop with the Qt graphical library: an analog clock with hour, minute, and second hands, a drawing program that draws lines, rectangles, and ellipses in different colors, and an editor where the user can input and edit text. We will learn how to handle windows and widgets as well as menus and toolbars in the Qt Library. We will also learn how to draw figures and write text, and how to catch mouse and keyboard input.

Chapter 6, Enhancing the Qt Graphical Applications, further develops the three graphical applications: the analog clock, the drawing program, and the editor. We add digits to the clock dial, we add the possibility to move, modify, and cut-and-paste figures in the drawing program, and we add the possibility to change font and text alignment in the editor.

Chapter 7, The Games, introduces you to basic game development. In this chapter, we develop the games Othello, and Noughts and Crosses with the Qt library. In Othello, two players take turn adding marks, colored black and white, to the game grid in order to enclose the opponent's marks. In Noughts and Crosses, two players take turns adding noughts and crosses to a game grid in order to place five marks in a row.

Chapter 8, The Computer Plays, empowers the computer to play against a human player. In Othello, the computer tries to add marks that enclose as many as possible of the opponent’s marks. In Nought and Crosses, the computer tries to add marks to obtain five marks in a row, and to prevent the opponent to get five marks in a row.

Chapter 9, Domain–Specific Language, teaches you to develop a Domain-Specific Language (DSL), which is a language intended for a specific domain. More specifically, we develop a language for writing graphical objects in a Qt widget. We start by formally defining our language with a grammar. We then write a scanner that recognizes meaningful sequences of characters, a parser that checks that the source code complies with the grammar, and a viewer that displays the graphical objects.

Chapter 10, Advanced Domain–Specific Language, improves on our Domain-Specific Language in several ways: we add selection and iteration that alter the flow of the program, we add variables that can be assigned to values during the program execution, and we add functions with parameters and a return value.

This book is intended for every reader, from the beginner to the more proficient C++ programmer. However, some previous experience with C++ is useful.

The examples of this book are developed in Visual Studio and Qt Creator.

class Person {
   public:
     Person(string name);
     virtual void print();
   private:
     string m_name;
 };

class Person {
   public:
Person(string name);
     virtual void print();
   private:
     string m_name;
 };

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